1. Field
Embodiments of the invention relate to digital communications. More specifically, one embodiment of the invention relates to a system, apparatus and method for digital rights management using one-time programmable keys.
2. General Background
Analog communication systems are rapidly giving way to their digital counterparts. Similarly, the explosive growth of the Internet and the World Wide Web have resulted in an increase of downloadable audio-visual files, such as video files, MP3-formatted audio files, and other digital content.
Simultaneously with, and in part due to this rapid move to digital communications system, there have been significant advances in digital recording devices. Digital versatile disk (DVD) recorders, digital VHS video cassette recorders (D-VHS VCR), CD-ROM recorders (e.g., CD-R and CD-RW), MP3 recording devices, and hard disk-based recording units are but merely representative of the digital recording devices that are capable of producing high quality recordings and copies thereof, without the generational degradation (i.e., increased degradation between successive copies) known in the analog counterparts.
The combination of movement towards digital communication systems and digital recording devices poses a concern to content owners such as the motion picture and music industries, who are reluctant in providing downloadable digital content due to fears of unauthorized and uncontrolled copying such digital content. In response, digital rights management schemes have been deployed into set-top boxes that receive digital content from providers of such content.
“Digital Rights Management” (DRM) is a mechanism for ensuring that digital content is properly handled in accordance with the rights granted by either a content owner or a content provider. Previously, DRMs were configured to perform simple conditional access to broadcast content. This processing was accomplished by a cryptographic coprocessor or peripheral hardware such as a smart card operating in cooperation with the main central processing unit (CPU). While this configuration may have provided secure delivery of the digital content to the subscriber, it suffered from the cost of a separate security circuit, failed to fully ensure security of the digital content after delivery, and was difficult to reprogram for new rules imposed by the content owner or content provider. Modern set-top boxes can now store content for future viewing, and they can network content to other devices through digital interfaces, e.g. Ethernet, IEEE 1394 or HDMI. The rules for handling content have grown as a result. It would be desirable to flexibility and dynamically address content handling rules as they evolve while maintaining cost effective security of decryption keys.